28 entries categorized "Disease / Public Health"

May 18, 2016

BBC News reports the Zika virus could spread to Europe this summer, although the likelihood of an outbreak is low to moderate, the World Health Organization has said. Areas most at risk are those where Aedes mosquitoes may spread the virus, like the Black Sea coast of Russia and Georgia and the island of Madeira. Countries with a moderate risk include France, Spain, Italy and Greece, while the risk in the UK is low. The UN agency is not issuing any new travel advice at this time.

May 02, 2016

BBC News reports the mosquito-borne Zika virus may be even more dangerous than previously thought, scientists in Brazil say. They told the BBC that Zika could be behind more damaging neurological conditions, affecting the babies of up to a fifth of infected pregnant women. Rates of increase in Zika infection in some parts of Brazil have slowed, thanks to better information about preventing the disease. But the search for a vaccine is still in the early stages.

February 01, 2016

BBC News reports a cluster of microcephaly linked to the Zika virus in Latin America poses a global public health emergency requiring a united response, says the World Health Organization. Experts are worried that the virus is spreading far and fast, with devastating consequences. The infection has been linked to thousands of babies being born with underdeveloped brains. The WHO alert puts Zika in the same category of concern as Ebola. It means research and aid will be fast-tracked to tackle the infection.

January 28, 2016

The New York Times reports officials from the World Health Organization said on Thursday that the Zika virus was “spreading explosively” in the Americas and announced that they would convene an emergency meeting on Monday to decide whether to declare a public health emergency. “The level of alarm is extremely high,” said Dr. Margaret Chan, the director general of the W.H.O., in a speech in Geneva. As many as three to four million people in the Americas could be exposed to the virus in the next 12 months, said Dr. Sylvain Aldighieri, a unit chief for the Pan American Health Organization.

February 11, 2015

Al Jazeera reports the U.S. military is preparing to withdraw all but 100 of the 2,800 troops it currently has deployed to West Africa in response to the Ebola epidemic, the Pentagon has announced. In a statement on Tuesday, spokesman Rear Admiral John Kirby said "nearly all will return by April 30." U.S. officials said Washington was ready to scale back its five-month mission in Liberia and Senegal in the coming weeks, as officials believed the crisis had largely been contained. The news came a week after The World Health Organisation (WHO) confirmed the number of new Ebola cases had risen for first time in 2015 in all three of the hardest hit countries of West Africa.

November 13, 2014

The Washington Post reports more than 80 U.S. service members will arrive in Virginia on Thursday after deploying to Liberia as part of the U.S. effort to stop the spread of the Ebola virus and will remain in conditions resembling a quarantine for 21 days. The troops will arrive around noon at Joint Base Langley-Eustis, about 70 miles southeast of Richmond, said Rear Adm. John Kirby, the Pentagon press secretary. None of the troops are showing any signs of the virus, but they will be in “controlled monitoring” for the next three weeks. It marks the first time the military has monitored troops in that manner in the United States. The group includes 51 members of the Air Force; 27 from the Navy; four in the Marine Corps and two in the Army, Kirby said. They will undergo medical screening twice a day and be housed in a secluded area of the base west of the flightline that includes a dining hall and a gym. They will not be able to see their families in person.

October 28, 2014

Politico reports the White House threw a fit this weekend when two governors defied its Ebola policy and ordered mandatory quarantines of aid workers returning from West Africa. But then Obama officials threw up their arms, suggesting they didn’t have the legal authority to overrule the governors — even though they very well might. Legal and public health experts said Monday that the federal government does have quarantine powers it could assert in the Ebola crisis, particularly when it comes to interstate and international travelers such as Kaci Hickox, a nurse who recently treated Ebola patients in Sierra Leone. She was detained in New Jersey under a quarantine imposed by Gov. Chris Christie but was allowed to travel to Maine Monday after the White House complained and her lawyer questioned the legality of the rules.

October 21, 2014

The New York Times reports anyone flying to the United States from Ebola-affected countries in West Africa must enter the country through one of five airports screening for the disease, Homeland Security Secretary Jeh C. Johnson said Tuesday as the Obama administration stepped up precautions to stop the spread of the virus. Last week, the government instituted temperature checks for West Africans arriving at Kennedy International in New York, Newark Liberty International, Washington Dulles International, O’Hare International in Chicago, and Hartsfield-Jackson International in Atlanta. The five airports already account for 94 percent of all arrivals from the affected countries, Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea. A fever is one symptom of the disease and an indication that the person could be infectious.

October 20, 2014

The Associated Press reports after rallying dozens of nations to join the fight against Islamic State militants, President Barack Obama is back in the coalition-building business - this time to fight the Ebola outbreak in West Africa. Obama is working the phones with world leaders, appealing to them via videoconference and publicly jawboning with one clear message: Stopping the deadly virus at its source is the single best way to prevent the outbreak from spreading. And that requires an infusion of additional money and resources to the hard-hit countries of Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea. The U.S. already has two confirmed cases of Ebola in nurses who cared for a Liberian man who died of the disease. Additional cases are likely, officials say.

October 15, 2014

BBC News reports a second health worker in t Texas has tested positive for Ebola, health officials say. Both health workers treated Liberian man Thomas Duncan, who died last week after becoming the first person diagnosed with Ebola in the U.S. A local judge said there was a "real possibility" of further cases, and contingencies were being prepared. Meanwhile, the UN's Ebola mission chief says the world is falling behind in the race to contain the virus. The World Health Organization (WHO) says 4,447 people have died from the outbreak, mainly in West Africa. Sierra Leone, Liberia and Guinea have been hardest hit by the outbreak, which began in December 2013 but was confirmed in March. President Barack Obama is due to hold a video conference with British, French, German and Italian leaders to discuss the Ebola crisis later on Wednesday.

October 08, 2014

CNBC reports federal officials have ordered agents at U.S. airports and other points of entry to observe all arriving travelers for signs of Ebola. An administration official told NBC News that travelers from West African nations most affected by Ebola will be subjected to additional screening in separate areas. Such measures include having their temperatures taken and filling out a questionnaire. Customs and Border Protection agents are also giving out symptom fact sheets to travelers and providing directions to call a doctor if they become sick in the next 21 days, Homeland Security Deputy Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said at an airport security conference in Northern Virginia. Although Mayorkas did not expand on how they will be observing travelers or when the new measures start, he did confirm that agents are searching for "general signs of illness."

October 07, 2014

The Associated Press reports public hospitals in New York City are so concerned about Ebola, they've secretly been sending actors with mock symptoms into emergency rooms to test how well the triage staffs identify and isolate possible cases. A small Ohio hospital has hung up signs imploring patients to let nurses know immediately if they have traveled recently to West Africa. And across the U.S., one of the nation's largest ambulance companies has put together step-by-step instructions for wrapping the interior of a rig with plastic sheeting. There hasn't been a single confirmed case of an Ebola infection happening on U.S. soil; the case confirmed in Dallas involves a man who, like several health care workers treated in the U.S., contracted the virus in Liberia. But health care providers are worried enough to take a wide variety of precautions.

October 03, 2014

The New York Times reports NBC News on Friday identified the freelance cameraman who contracted Ebola in Liberia as 33-year-old Ashoka Mukpo, who had been working with Dr. Nancy Snyderman, the network’s top medical correspondent. Mukpo is the fourth American known to have contracted the disease in Liberia. Speaking on NBC’s "Today" show, the parents of Mr. Mukpo said their son was in good spirits. “Obviously he is scared and worried,” the father, Dr. Mitchell Levy said. Mukpo’s mother, Diane Mukpo said her son would be flown back to the United States this weekend for treatment. “I think the enormous anxiety that I have as a mother or that we share as parents is the delay between now and him leaving on Sunday,” Mukpo said.

September 16, 2014

The New York Times reports under pressure to do more to confront the Ebola outbreak sweeping across West Africa, President Obama on Tuesday is to announce an expansion of military and medical resources to combat the spread of the deadly virus, administration officials said. The president will go beyond the 25-bed portable hospital that Pentagon officials said they would establish in Liberia, one of the three West African countries ravaged by the disease, officials said. Obama will offer help to President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf of Liberia in the construction of as many as 17 Ebola treatment centers in the region, with about 1,700 treatment beds. Senior administration officials said Monday night that the Department of Defense would open a joint command operation in Monrovia, Liberia, to coordinate the international effort to combat the disease.

September 02, 2014

BBC News reports a global military intervention is needed to curb the largest ever Ebola outbreak, according to the medical charity Medecins Sans Frontieres. In a damning criticism of world leaders, it says the global response has so far been "lethally inadequate." The charity said countries were turning their back on West Africa and merely reducing the risk of Ebola arriving on their shores. More than 1,550 people have died in the outbreak which started in Guinea. At least 3,000 people have been infected with the virus, but the World Health Organization (WHO) has warned that more than 20,000 people are likely to be infected. MSF said military and civilian teams capable of dealing with a biological disaster were needed immediately as the spread of Ebola "will not be prevented without a massive deployment."

August 29, 2014

CNN reports the West African country of Senegal has confirmed its first Ebola case one week after closing its border with Guinea over fears that the deadly outbreak could spread, the Senegalese Press Agency reported Friday. Senegal's health minister, Awa Marie Coll Seck, confirmed that a 21-year-old university student from Guinea was infected with the Ebola virus and placed in quarantine in the Fann Hospital in Dakar, the news agency reported. The Ebola outbreak "continues to accelerate" in West Africa and has killed 1,552 people, the World Health Organization said Thursday. The total number of cases stands at 3,069, with 40% occurring in the past three weeks. "However, most cases are concentrated in only a few localities," the WHO said.

August 18, 2014

The Associated Press reports Ebola-affected countries should immediately begin exit screening all passengers leaving international airports, sea ports and major ground crossings, the U.N. health agency urged on Monday. The risk of the Ebola virus being transmitted during air travel is low because unlike infections such as influenza or tuberculosis, it is not spread by breathing air and airborne particles from an infected person. Nonetheless, the World Health Organization said anyone with an illness consistent with the virus should not be allowed to travel normally and all passengers should routinely wash their hands and avoid direct contact with body fluids of infected people. The Geneva-based agency has been criticized by non-U.N. health organizations as being slow to call for an emergency response to the Ebola crisis. Some countries already have banned direct flights to countries hit by the disease. Most airlines flying in and out of the Liberian capital of Monrovia have suspended their flights. The Ivory Coast, which shares borders with Liberia and Guinea, has banned direct flights from those countries.

August 12, 2014

BBC News reports untested drugs can be used to treat patients infected with the Ebola virus, the World Health Organization says. The WHO said it was ethical in light of the scale of the outbreak and high number of deaths - more than 1,000 people have died in West Africa. The statement was made after its medical experts met in Switzerland on Monday to discuss the issue. But officials warned there were very limited supplies of potential treatments. The WHO said where experimental treatments are used there must be informed consent and the results of the treatment collected and shared. But the organization conceded there were still many questions to be answered including how data could be gathered effectively while the focus remained on providing good medical care. It was also unclear where the funding for the treatment would come from.

August 11, 2014

The New York Times reports Ebola, one of the world’s most fatal diseases, has surfaced in Africa’s most populous country. Nigerian health officials have announced 10 confirmed cases and two deaths in the country from the Ebola outbreak that is sweeping West Africa, including a nurse and a man from Liberia whom the nurse had been caring for. The man, Patrick Sawyer, a naturalized American citizen, had flown to Nigeria in late July and died soon after. He had infected at least eight other people, including the nurse, who died on Tuesday, officials said. By Friday, President Goodluck Jonathan had declared a state of emergency, officially adding Nigeria, home to more than 160 million people, to the list of nations struggling to control one of the largest public-health emergencies in recent history. More than 900 people have died.

December 13, 2013

12/13/13: The Miami Herald reports attacks on polio teams in northwest Pakistan on Friday killed a polio worker and two policemen assigned to protect one of the teams, police and a government official said. In both attacks, gunmen fled the scene after the killings. No group claimed responsibility for the attacks, but Pakistani militants have killed more than a dozen polio workers and police protecting them over the past year. They accuse health workers of acting as spies for Washington and claim the polio vaccine is intended to make Muslim children sterile. In the first attack Friday, gunmen opened fire on two officers as they were riding on a motorcycle to the town of Swabi, where they were supposed to protect a polio team during a vaccination drive, according to police officer Khalid Iqbal. The town lies 100 kilometers (60 miles) northeast of Peshawar, the capital of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province. Iqbal said authorities were trying to find the attackers and arrest them. Pakistan is one of only three countries where the virus is still endemic. Militants have targeted workers vaccinating children, policemen escorting polio teams in the tribal and urban areas in the northwest and elsewhere, and have also threatened people who want to get their children vaccinated.

12/13/13: The BBC reports the UN's Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) has been blamed for the spread of a kidney disease which has affected nearly half a million people in Sri Lanka. Scientists believe the illness is caused by pesticides and fertilisers. The FAO is accused by campaigners of encouraging the use of agrochemicals on behalf of multinational companies. But the FAO strongly denies it is to blame for the spread of Chronic Kidney Disease of Unknown Aetiology (CKDu). For at least 20 years many Sri Lankans in farming communities have been suffering from a mystery kidney disease - 20,000 are reported to have died while 450,000 are affected.

December 07, 2013

12/07/13: The Miami Herald reports a long-awaited study by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shows a link between tainted tap water at a US Marine Corps base in North Carolina and increased risk of serious birth defects and childhood cancers. The authors of the study on Camp Lejeune released late Thursday by the CDC's Agency for Toxic Substances & Disease Registry warned it is based on a small sample size and cannot prove exposure to the chemicals caused specific individuals to become ill. But the study did conclude that babies born to mothers who drank Lejeune tap water while pregnant were four times more likely than women who lived off-base to have such serious birth defects as spina bifida. Babies whose mothers were exposed also had a slightly elevated risk of such childhood cancers as leukemia, according to the results. The study surveyed the parents of 12,598 children born at Lejeune between 1968 and 1985, the year most contaminated drinking water wells were closed. They reported 106 cases of serious birth defects and childhood hematopoietic cancers. Of those, researchers said they could obtain medical records to confirm the diagnoses in only 52 cases.

12/07/13: The New York Times reports health officials in Hong Kong late Friday reported the city’s second confirmed case of avian influenza in a week, in an 80-year-old man who resides in the neighboring mainland Chinese city of Shenzhen. The man, whom officials did not name, had spent two weeks in a hospital in Shenzhen being treated for chronic illness before arriving in Hong Kong on Tuesday and checking in to the Tuen Mun Hospital. He developed a fever on Friday morning and was immediately put into isolation, where he tested positive for the H7N9 avian influenza, Hong Kong’s Center for Health and Protection said in a statement. It is the second case of the deadly virus in the city, after a 36-year-old Indonesian woman was confirmed on Monday to have contracted the disease after traveling across the border to Shenzhen, where she purchased a chicken, slaughtered it and then ate it. The H7N9 influenza virus normally circulates among birds and has only recently begun to affect humans. So far it has infected 136 people across 12 Chinese provinces, killing 45 of them, according to an October report by the World Health Organization, the most recent one available on the organization’s website. Most of those cases were reported in March and April of this year, and almost none emerged over the warm summer months. But as the weather turns colder, the arrival of the traditional flu season has been cause for greater vigilance on the part of health officials and the general public. Confirmation of a second case in Hong Kong raises concerns because the city of 7 million is a global transportation hub, and also because it has a long history of viral outbreaks.

November 24, 2013

11/24/13: The LA Times reports despite intense pressure to hold down federal spending, the Defense Department is launching a high-priced effort to create its own production pipeline for vaccines and biodefense drugs — an initiative that defies the advice of government-hired experts and duplicates what another agency is doing. Construction began in late October on a plant in north Florida that will produce flu vaccine and specialized medicines for the Pentagon to protect military personnel against germ warfare agents. To begin paying for the initiative, the Obama administration has quietly shifted millions of dollars that had been budgeted for better masks, boots, early-warning sensors and other equipment for troops at risk of exposure to chemical or biological weapons, according to government documents and defense specialists. The Department of Health and Human Services, meanwhile, is on track to spend billions of dollars to produce the same types of medicines in collaboration with private drug companies and university researchers.

November 12, 2013

11/12/13: The BBC reports efforts to vaccinate 165,000 children against polio in Sudan have been blocked by the government and rebels, the UN humanitarian chief says. John Ging said the two sides should stop "filibustering" and give health workers access to children in the South Kordofan and Blue Nile states. The government and rebels had ignored a Security Council resolution to give health workers access, he said. The UN fears that conflict in the two states could lead to a polio outbreak. According to the UN World Health Organization, Sudan has been polio-free for more than two years. South Kordofan and Blue Nile border South Sudan, which seceded from Sudan in 2011 after a peace deal to end years of civil war.

November 09, 2013

11/09/13: The Miami Herald reports the UN says a massive campaign to vaccinate children in the Middle East against polio has begun after the first cases in 14 years were confirmed in northeastern Syria last week. The UN children's fund said Friday that Red Crescent and government health workers in Syria and neighboring countries aim to immunize 20 million children. UNICEF says 10 children have so far been paralyzed by the virus and it poses a risk to hundreds of thousands of children across the region. It says preliminary evidence indicates that the strain in Syria is of Pakistani origin and is similar to one found in sewage samples in Egypt, Israel and the Palestinian territories. Polio has been eradicated in most countries but remains endemic in Pakistan, Afghanistan and Nigeria.

October 10, 2013

10/10/13: The New York Times reports the UN was hit with a double dose of scrutiny over its accountability practices on Wednesday, charged in a lawsuit with gross negligence in Haiti's deadly cholera epidemic, and accused by an anticorruption organization of oversight lapses in its own peacekeeping operations around the world. The cholera suit, filed in Federal District Court in Manhattan, is one of the most organized legal challenges to UN assertions that it is immune to such litigation. Lawyers for victims of the epidemic, citing facts not in dispute, said the United Nations knew or should have known that Nepalese members of its peacekeeping force in Haiti had been infected with cholera from their home country and had spread the disease through reckless sewage disposal, “resulting in explosive and massive” cholera outbreaks. The epidemic, which began in Haiti in October 2010 as the country was reeling from that year’s powerful earthquake, has killed more than 8,300 people, sickened more than 650,000 and continues to kill about 1,000 a year. The United Nations secretary general, Ban Ki-moon, has not acknowledged any negligence by the world body in the outbreak and has rejected requests to compensate victims and their families, citing a treaty that affords the United Nations immunity.

September 17, 2013

09/17/13: The New York Times reports federal health officials reported Monday that at least two million Americans fall ill from antibiotic-resistant bacteria every year and that at least 23,000 die from those infections, putting a hard number on a growing public health threat. It was the first time that federal authorities quantified the effects of organisms that many antibiotics are powerless to fight. The number of deaths is substantially lower than previous estimates, in part because researchers from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention stripped out cases in which a drug-resistant infection was present but not necessarily the cause of death. Infectious disease doctors have long warned that antibiotic resistance — in which bacteria develop defenses against antibiotics used to kill them — threatens to return society to a time when people died from ordinary infections.